Smear Campaign

Former KGB General Says Pius XII Was Targeted

VATICAN
CITY — As Pope Pius XII’s beatification process nears a crucial stage,
startling evidence has come to light that further undermines the longstanding
accusation that he did too little to save the Jews in World War II.

In
an article published Jan. 25 by National Review Online, retired KGB general Ion
Mihai Pacepa claimed Soviet agents set out to deliberately portray the wartime
Pope “as a coldhearted Nazi sympathizer” as part of a “super-secret plan for
destroying the Vatican’s moral authority.”

After
an ineffective campaign of smearing the Holy See as being “in the pay of
American imperialism,” the Kremlin changed tactics in 1960 and tried to discredit
the Vatican with its own priests, according to Pacepa.

Pius
XII was singled out because he had died in 1958. “Dead men cannot defend
themselves,” was the KGB’s slogan at the time. Pacepa, a former Romanian agent
and the highest-ranking KGB officer to defect from the Soviet bloc, claims that
former Soviet President Nikita Khrushchev was behind the plan.

Pacepa
recounts how, lacking evidence to besmirch Pius XII’s reputation, the KGB asked
him to seek access to the Vatican secret archives. The former agent says he was
instructed to use the premise that Romania was interested in seeing Vatican
files to determine whether there was historical justification for restoring
relations between Romania and the Holy See. Pacepa alleges the Vatican was also
offered a $1 billion interest-free loan for 25 years in return for access to
the archives.

Between
1960 and 1962, the former agent claims he sent hundreds of archived documents
connected with Pius XII, none of which was incriminating. The KGB then
“slightly modified” them.

Soon
after, in 1963, a play called The Deputy, which attacked Pius XII, was written. It was the
first major incident in which his reputation regarding World War II was
publicly called into question.

Pacepa
says the play’s producer, Erwin Piscator, was a fervent communist with close
links to Moscow and that he based the play on the doctored documents that
Pacepa had stolen from the Vatican archives. (The play was later abridged by
German playwright Rolf Hochhuth, who injected even more venom than was
contained in the original.)

Speaking
to the Register Jan. 31, Sister Margherita Marchione, a Religious Teachers
Filippini sister who has spent most of her life trying to clear Pius XII’s
name, said the claims of Kremlin involvement were very plausible. She said that
Archbishop Fulton Sheen had expressed his concerns about a Soviet campaign
against Pius XII as early as 1946, in a letter to The New York Times.

“I
really think it’s down to the communists,” said Sister Marchione, who is
currently working on her latest publication on Pius XII, a question-and-answer
booklet that will be published later this year. “They were so angry with the
Church after the war.”

Pius
XII and Vatican officials attracted the hostility of the Kremlin after
repeatedly warning in the 1940s and 1950s that communism was incompatible with
Church teaching. The Vatican also resisted the advance of postwar communism in
Europe, particularly in Italy, where communists would almost certainly have
formed a government if not for Pius XII’s plea not to vote for them.

Jesuit
Father Peter Gumpel, postulator of Pius XII’s cause, described Pacepa’s
disclosures as “very interesting,” but he has some doubts about the ex-KGB
agent’s account. In particular, like Sister Margherita, he was not aware of any
evidence the KGB had infiltrated the Vatican archives.

As
the Register went to press, Father Gumpel was waiting to hear from the prefect
of the Vatican archives to find out whether Pacepa’s claims are true.

Pius
XII’s cause, meanwhile, is progressing. Father Gumpel said that after
undergoing scrutiny from historians and theologians, 3,500 pages of
documentation are now being examined by a panel of cardinals and bishops.

Father
Gumpel estimates that in four to five months the panel will agree to pass the
paperwork on to Pope Benedict, who will then decide whether to issue a decree
testifying to evidence of Pius XII’s heroic virtue and reputation for holiness.
If he does, Pius XII would then be declared “venerable.”

Beatification,
which will depend on verifying the authenticity of reported miracles, is a
longer process, but Father Gumpel said he hoped “it will happen soon.”

If
so, it will have taken place despite the Soviet campaign to discredit Pius XII
and despite the critical judgments from those who believed the Kremlin’s slurs.
As Pacepa noted in his National Review article, quoting former KGB chief Yury Andropov,
“People are more ready to believe smut than holiness.”

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